Android Market to show content ratings

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With the popularity of Apps on every mobile OS increasing daily it does not come as a surprise that a rating system is being adopted by Google for its Android Marketplace. Apple of course already has tight restrictions on what can and what can’t be sold through their App store. Hence the reason why some developers head to jailbreaking for releasing their unofficial wares, but at least Apple has a policy in place to prevent inappropriate content getting into the hands of younger children.

Whilst maintaining its open source nature Google has announced that in a couple of weeks time, they will also be putting in-place tighter controls, by showing content ratings for all apps listed in the Android Market. It has had a content rating system in the past, but this was not exactly shown to users and the enforcement was a little lax. Because of this sometimes you could download an app thinking you would be getting a cool game for the kids, only to find that it had more mature content than you first realized. Now when you view an app from the marketplace it will show one of four content rating levels: All, Pre-teen, Teen, & Mature.

Google’s Eric Chu commented…

Starting next week, Android developers are going to be required to submit new or updated apps with one of these ratings if they want to be included in the Market. Developers not doing updates or new uploads are also being asked to add a rating to their app, and they’ll have “several weeks” to do so. But be warned: those that do not will find their apps default to the “Mature” rating. This new capability will provide users with additional information to help them select the best applications for them.